Secretary’s Advisory Committee on National Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Objectives for 2020

Ninth Meeting: February 23, 2009

Committee Recommendations (Approved by Vote)

All Committee members who were present voted to approve the memo, “Recommendations for Immediate Actions in Support of the Health Objectives to Improve the Health of the American People.”

All Committee members who were present voted to approve the Report of the Subcommittee on System Requirements, with modifications as noted below.

Next Steps

The Committee reached consensus that the Topic Areas of Healthy People 2020 should not be organized under the four categories of the Mission Statement.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services requested that the Committee finalize topic areas this month so that it can address target-setting methodologies at its March meeting.

Ronald Manderscheid agreed to revise the System Specifications report to include the following additional elements:

A third example of a potential system query that would address health determinants, and interventions to address them.

The notion that funders need consider how to advance Healthy People by funding the kinds of programs that Healthy People supports.

A recommendation that the platform for the database has to be flexible so that it does not quickly become outdated.

An estimated range of costs to produce the system.

The Committee decided that Subcommittee charges should be rephrased as a series of questions, and sent back to the full Committee for comment.

Committee members agreed to notify NORC and/or subcommittee chairs of which subcommittees they would like to join, and to send their suggestions for potential external members.

ODPHP and the Committee will keep informed of activities related to Healthy People 2020 that could align with the initiative (e.g. State of the USA’s health indicator set, or the activities of the Alliance to Make US Healthiest).

Dr. Kumanyika offered to create an overview of the product of the Committee’s Phase II work.

The Committee will hold a Web-based meeting in February. Monthly, Web-based meetings will be held throughout the spring. Members will determine at a later date whether they should meet in-person in the late spring or early summer.

I. Topic Areas: Presentation and DiscussionDr. Jonathan Fielding, Chair of the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Objectives for 2020, welcomed participants to the Committee’s ninth meeting. He explained that the agenda would begin with a presentation by Dr. Patrick Remington, Chair of the Subcommittee on Topic Areas, as Dr. Remington needed to leave the meeting early. The Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (ODPHP) had asked for feedback by March on the Committee’s recommendations for “topic areas” to organize the Healthy People 2020 objectives, so there was a need for timely discussion on this issue. After the presentation, the meeting would follow the stated agenda.

Dr. Patrick Remington said that there had been strong participation in the discussions of the Subcommittee on Topic Areas. The Subcommittee had explored possible approaches to developing topic areas, which are organizing categories for objectives. He showed how the organizing categories for Healthy People had evolved over the decades. The 15 “priority areas” of the 1990 Health Objectives were clumped within the broad categories of health protection, health promotion, and preventive services; the 22 priority areas of Healthy People 2000 were organized within four categories (including the three from the previous decade, plus “data and surveillance.”) There were 28 “focus areas” for Healthy People 2010, and they were not organized within broader categories, but “enabling goals” were articulated.